1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates generally to food processing of food items and, more particularly, to automated food processing, storing and dispensing of food items, such as at a quick-service type restaurant.
2. Background Art
In restaurants, especially quick-service restaurants, rapid, consistent, efficient and safe food preparation is essential for a successful operation. The quality of the prepared food depends in large part on the consistency of food preparation and storage. The food must be cooked using correct procedures and must be processed after cooking under appropriate conditions for the proper time.
Consistency in food preparation and storage times for cooked food items may vary as a result of many factors. For example, people engaged in food preparation often must perform multiple tasks at frequencies that vary with time because of constantly varying customer demand throughout the day. For example, lunchtime and dinnertime may be extremely busy while other periods may be relatively slow. The product mix can vary from hour to hour and day to day. As a result, the consistency and quality of food may vary. Difficulties in proper scheduling of food production during peak and non-peak periods can cause customer delays and/or stale, wasted or unusable food. Food preparation can be labor intensive, and thus, the labor cost can be a large portion of the total cost of the prepared food. Additionally, food items stored under conditions that maintain temperatures at an appropriate level often utilize infrared heat lamps that emit rays that may affect the comfort level of the employees.
Quick-service restaurants must be able to effectively meet a variable customer demand that is time dependent and not subject to precise prediction. As a result, stores relying totally on human operators performing their function at predetermined times will necessarily occasionally be overstaffed and at other times be under-staffed. Also, potential health and safety concerns can arise with the amount of direct contact of the operator with the food being prepared. By reducing or minimizing human contact with food and food cooking equipment, health and safety concerns can also be reduced or minimized. Any time or work savings that can be implemented will assist in maintaining consistency of food quality and with employer satisfaction with working conditions at higher levels.
Although quick-service restaurants have existed for many years and now number in the tens of thousands, such establishments utilize manual labor to prepare and process food. While there have been various improvements in commercial equipment used for cooking and processing cooked food in quick-service restaurants, such restaurants are believed to be substantially all manually operated and are relatively labor intensive.
Restaurants, and particularly the quick-service type of restaurant, depend upon quickly preparing, packaging and serving food in order to minimize customer waiting and to ensure freshness and quality of the food items when served to the customer. Equipment operators in a quick-service restaurant prepare food items, for example French fries, in bulk, typically tossing them from a fry basket into a holding or storage area. The bulk food items may then be salted by hand or with a handheld salting device that ensures a controlled portion of salt is delivered to the food items in the holding area. The salted food items are sometimes manually tumbled or agitated to distribute the salt amongst the food items, for example French fries. Cost and labor savings devices are desirable in the food preparation process. For example, automated salting, with a predetermined amount of salt, of a batch of bulk food items reduces the amount of manual time needed to prepare and serve the food items. Moreover, while some operator contact with the food is to be expected, certain operations and work stations that are automated so as reduce the need for human contact and attention will greatly alleviate some of these potential problems.
Non-uniform salting may result when done manually. Also, at times there is a delay between when the cooked French fries are delivered to the holding area and when they are salted, perhaps because the attention of the operator is diverted to performance of other tasks. While the French fries are sitting, they begin to cool, and when they are eventually salted, the adhesion of salt is poor. Other times, the holding area may not be emptied before another batch of cooked French fries is transferred into the holding area. When these freshly cooked fries are salted, the fries from the previous batch end up being oversalted.
A need exists for an apparatus and method for automating the preparation of seasoned food items, such as bulk salted French fries, wherein the work station, system and method further enhance the consistency of salting, and improve the overall distribution and adhesion of salt or other seasoning on the cooked food. Automation of other portions of the food processing operation is desirable to reduce the number of operational steps for which the operator is responsible during food processing. While these needs and desires exist for the preparation of salted French fries, it is also recognized that seasoning needs exist for any foods, breaded or non-breaded, which are prepared in-batch or individually and are subsequently seasoned, for example, but not limited to: other fried or cooked vegetables, chicken pieces or nuggets, shrimp, fish fillets and so forth.
Accordingly, a need exists for increased automation for a commercially suitable food dispensing and packaging device, system and method for fried foods that can be operated with a minimum of human intervention, attention and maintenance. More particularly, a need exists for a food packaging station, system and method that is capable of, without excessive human labor, processing food items where various food products in desired quantities, such as bulk French fries, are stored, and also for seasoning the cooked food items and packaging the cooked food items in individual portion-sized containers while simultaneously reducing the amount of manual labor.
Where such systems and work stations may be incorporated in restaurant establishments by retrofitting of existing equipment, this will improve the work environment of the restaurant while simultaneously providing food having more consistent quality while using significantly less manual labor.